Bathurst Agricultural Museum is devoted to the lives of early settlers in the area.

As a community of artists, academics and musicians, many residents say they were attracted by the village's creative spirit.

Some came for a weekend and never left.

The Coathanger, a retro and vintage clothing store specializing in "shabby chic," is one among a group of art galleries and craft shops with funky collections.

The store feels like a museum -- old suitcases are stacked beside a 1970s toaster alongside piles of vinyl records and "Boys Own" annuals dating to the 1950s.

Out front, the small lawn is bordered by lavender bushes and features a white ceramic toilet topped with a pair of black stilettos.

"The toilet? I'm going to plant strawberries in it," says owner Lindi Pieterse, as if it's the most obvious thing in the world.

"It's a sleepy little town, but it really comes to life on a Sunday -- that's when the hippies come out," says resident Marcel Pullen who runs a pottery studio and shop with her husband.

"People live here because they want to get away from it all and there are some really interesting people here, like the couple down the road that run the Dancing Donkey."

That would be paleontologist Rob Gess and his wife Serena, whose unusually named shop in a small thatched hut sells African arts and crafts made by local artisans, as well as Serena's own line of natural organic products.

An advertisement for the Pig and Whistle boasts: "There's no thirst like Bathurst." Meanwhile, the pub door is inscribed with a bon mot of its own: "Bathurst is a drinking village with a farming problem."

Inside, a wall is dedicated more wisecracks: "Marriage is a relationship in which one person is always right and the other is the husband."

A leftover from early settlers, this is British wit at its silliest -- the sort found on old school seaside postcards and one-liners that might've gotten a rise out of Benny Hill.

Souvenirs of these gags can be found at The Corner Art Gallery, which sells shirts that can be printed with the customer's name alongside the line "Instant Idiot -- just add alcohol."